Missouri 93, Illinois 71 Postgame

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#326      

PtGd

P
PtGd
Everyone, listen up; get yourselves off the edge of the ledge, or open your chutes, if you've already jumped off.
The end hasn't come. There's still plenty of time. And shame on all you so quick to throw our Illini, Coach and all, under the moving bus.

The end of the road is a long ways off. OK, I agree, frustrating at the moment. But it's just a moment. Give them another month of B1G action.
Remember, this is school. We're still learning. We'll get there.

Coach U. has shown the ability to admit his mistakes and regroup. He will again, and we will win.

Trust me. Don't give up. We are Illini!

Now let's hear it: Go Illini.
 
#327      

ChiefGritty

ChiefGritty
Chicago, IL
ChiefGritty
BRucks said:
RJ looks like the puppy that got slapped for peeing on the carpet. Talk about poor body language.
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There are a lot of guys not playing up to their potential out there, but RJ and Rodgers are in full-bore "I don't know where to stand" mode at this point. They have crossed the threshold into the Maniscalco Zone.

No idea what happened in RJ's case. I'm never going to worry about a first semester freshman too much in Rodgers'
 
#328      

WyattEarp

WyattEarp
WyattEarp
dbeverly26 said:
The pack line is famous for requiring neither effort nor teamwork to execute successfully, right?
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No, it’s just a different approach/philosophy. It very much requires
teamwork, communication and focus.
 
#330      

WyattEarp

WyattEarp
WyattEarp
sacraig said:
This TEAM has a very high ceiling. This collection of players playing as 5 individuals does not.

Everyone is whining about the schemes on offense of defense but I don't think that's the problem. We aren't even running the schemes we have because we aren't playing as a team.

Chemistry has to be fixed first. No amount of scheming can overcome that.
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That’s right.
Any, scheme under the sun isn’t gonna work unless we fix what is ailing us first.

I don’t buy that our switching
Man defense is what is throwing us off/making it harder to know/tell who is accountable. It should be fairly straight forward. Switching is supposed to be easier in most ways. It would have to be
easier to teach than the full-on Martin ‘17 stuff.

Plenty of teams have certainly had plenty of success switching. Clearly, we thought we had comparable personal that could pull it off. We no doubt had a switching scheme in mind when we acquired and recruited the people that we did…lengthy, quick, athletic, dudes…1-5 (for the most part)

Its obviously, possible to devise something specific for certain teams and then for whatever reason it just doesn’t work out. Sampson, had an aggressive team M2M team at OU that couldn’t quite pull it off. Then he ended up scrapping it and going. to a 2-3 zone like most of the rest of the season. So it happens. Likewise, Brad has pulled back from his schemes and charted a new course mid-stream as we all know.

But I just do not think this is what the problem is here. The immediate issue is the:attitude/chemistry/focus/toughness/
and give-damn of everyone. Like you said.
 
#333      

BoiseBaller

B
BoiseBaller
CoachHooleyHoo said:
Here’s what I don’t understand. Hawkins plays like garbage and almost never gets benched. Melendez breathes wrong and he’s on the bench the rest of the night. I think one of the biggest issues is that BU has wrecked their confidence with some crazy substitution patterns.

Also, I like Epps but he's had his ups & downs as well. Skyy's gotta clean up the D but he's going to be good.
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Agree on Hawkins, but RJ has probably been the most disappointing player IMO this year. He makes a ton of mistakes on both ends of the court. I'd give most if not all his minutes to Sencire and Epps.
 
#334      

Jimbo

J
Jimbo
IllinoisssssssVarsity said:
Related to this, it seems to be a different guy letting us down every night or in different portions of the season.

Early, Mayer was pissing me off because he wouldn’t kick the ball ahead in transition and he was a ball stopper in the half court. I think he’s fixed that some. (As an Austin area HS school coach, Mayer is clearly an Austin area player)

Skyy looks like he has no interest in defense and Missouri hunted him at times last night.

Shannon thinks he’s curry because he got on a hot steak vs UCLA. He sells 4-5 possessions per game with a stupid 3. He finally went back into attack mode last night in the second half and had success. What a crazy idea.

I actually don’t have much of a problem with Coleman. I think he’s trying to do it the way they practice, but he gets frustrated when others don’t, and he loses his head. That obviously affects other parts of his game.

RJ and me are producing at about the same level right now.

Epps has been okay but he’s gonna make some freshman mistakes.

Sencire has been our most consistent player IMO.

If I’m Brad, I’m starting the 5 who played with heart in that late second half. The 5 the announcers talked about. Interestingly that lineup had Mayer and Shannon, but no Hawkins. So kinda counters what my observations are, but they were at least playing hard.
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Where do you coach in Austin? I agree the starting 5 should be changed.
 
#335      

Illini-Rule

I
Illini-Rule
Illini8420 said:
The most glaring issue right now is our defensive system and Skyy. I feel bad saying it because I know he's the top recruit and maybe he still has rust from the injury and he's only a freshman, but it's not working with him right now. Skyy is just not a capable defender in the switch everything defense. The whole thing breaks down when he's in the game. Opponents know they can easily hunt him on the switches. I don't know what the plus/minus is when he's out there, but I'm sure it's extremely bad. It's not a coincidence that we won the Texas game after we benched him. He is flat out unplayable right now unless something changes.

Either we scrap the switch everything defense and go back to regular man to man, or Skyy needs to have his minutes replaced by Harris, who actually does make it work when he's in there.
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I don't disagree that our defense has been atrocious. But when you score 2 points in 12 minutes you aren't going to win many games. On top of that we always seem to have several dry spells of not scoring. I think we've had that issue every game.
 
#337      

DJM

D
DJM
my thoughts,
we start:
2 transfers that have never played the offensive or defensive schemes they are now playing and have never played with or for anyone associated with the current team.
1 jr. who last year played in 33 games, started 19, averaged 19 mins a game and averaged 5.9 points a game, and he too has not played either O or D schemes before, and played with players who were the focal points of that team and are all gone.
1 soph who last year played in 22 games and started 1 game, averaged 8.5 mins per game and 3.8 points and see (CH above regarding O, D and players)
1 freshman- who was in high school last year.
off the bench we have:
1 transfer who last year played in 3 games and averaged 3 mins per game.
3 true freshman.
all of us and the media had extremely lofty praise and goals for such a young inexperienced team.
so, hopefully, they are all learning to listen, talk to each other, play hard, and be patient.
to those of you wanting to change our D or O at this point---really? what would that learning curve look like?
stay the course. It's gonna be bumpy and there are no guarantees, however, I looked forward to what this team could look and play like in (hopefully) a week or two. I know, time is running out but I'm not going anywhere.
 
#339      

Illini-Rule

I
Illini-Rule
All I know is even though CH has pretty good handles, I still don't want my 6'10" center/forward bringing the ball up the court at any point unless he is running a fast break and happened to rebound the ball at the top of the key.
 
#340      

ChiefGritty

ChiefGritty
Chicago, IL
ChiefGritty
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#341      

Emerson Bigguns

Emerson Bigguns
Emerson Bigguns
JFGsCoffeeMug said:
You post reminds me of an exchange between Ayo and Trent from two seasons ago:

It doesn't seem like we have enough of that mentality on the roster anymore, and it shows.
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I was just thinking the same. I feel like DMW would have planted someone into the third row at some point last night.

No one even looked mad.

I don’t know if the players dislike each other or don’t know each other well enough to get in each other’s faces, but IMO the coach shouldn’t be the only guy getting red faced when things go south. We need a leader on the court, and no one seems to be willing to step up.
 
#342      

jumpingjack

J
jumpingjack
Bucknell is getting lit up by Rutgers and yet looks far more dialed in than we did last night.
 
#343      

BretMyBeachHouse

B
BretMyBeachHouse
DJM said:
my thoughts,
we start:
2 transfers that have never played the offensive or defensive schemes they are now playing and have never played with or for anyone associated with the current team.
1 jr. who last year played in 33 games, started 19, averaged 19 mins a game and averaged 5.9 points a game, and he too has not played either O or D schemes before, and played with players who were the focal points of that team and are all gone.
1 soph who last year played in 22 games and started 1 game, averaged 8.5 mins per game and 3.8 points and see (CH above regarding O, D and players)
1 freshman- who was in high school last year.
off the bench we have:
1 transfer who last year played in 3 games and averaged 3 mins per game.
3 true freshman.
all of us and the media had extremely lofty praise and goals for such a young inexperienced team.
so, hopefully, they are all learning to listen, talk to each other, play hard, and be patient.
to those of you wanting to change our D or O at this point---really? what would that learning curve look like?
stay the course. It's gonna be bumpy and there are no guarantees, however, I looked forward to what this team could look and play like in (hopefully) a week or two. I know, time is running out but I'm not going anywhere.
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I know I was plenty concerned about the relative youth and inexperience going in. I'm sure lots were.

But I think I'd point to a different possible problem right now. In a way, we brought in two one and done players in TSJ and MM. They kinda pushed Hawkins to a new position and RJ to the bench. In March, each of those guys might have seen themselves in a different spot on this team.

They dynamics of one and dones no doubt vary for each player. But I have to think that bringing in one, perhaps two, into a team that's already pretty cohesive is probably the ideal. I don't want to be too harsh, but TSJ and MM don't really have a built up loyalty to the others players and further, the other players, having not been playing together much, have a similiar issue.

If any of this is part of the problem, it's probably a hard thing to rein in for Underwood. Still time.
 
#350      

GBIllini

G
GBIllini
jumpingjack said:
Hawkins can shoot, score inside and break guys down off the dribble. He's just not doing it.
Why?
Who @#$& knows?
But he's absolutely capable.
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I agree his inside scoring is really puzzling to me. The last few games he acts like he is afraid to put it up within 5 feet of the basket if it's going to be halfway contested. The closer he gets to the basket the smaller he plays. You’re 6'10" dammit, go up with some authority and aggression please!
 
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